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Mikojan posted:The timing for these strikes is just weird. You'd think they'd do it after a prolonged stalemate where spirits might drop among Ukrainian population, to tilt it to a unfavourable stance and maybe force some talks. But just after a morale booster like taking Kherson? I know pettyness is the answer, but it just feels so dumb Also let's say the Russian military gradually loses any kind of capability to hold Ukrainian territory and retreats to 1994 boundaries. What stops the Russians from just constantly firing missiles every few months to blow up infrastructure, rebuilding efforts and scare away western investors and contractors from ever building up Ukraine? There is a long game in all of this conflict. If/When Russia retreats there will be a massive economic zone of buffer states (vs Russia) that will all want to deal with the United States. Countless natural resources, an extremely educated population (most of the Soviet Union's biggest engineering, aeronautical and space triumphs were from Ukrainians). It may not seem like it now, but Eastern Europe is going to be a counterweight to the Rhein River industrial economy and will offer a lot of promising advantages for diversifying US trade away from China and also reducing European dependence on Chinese trade. The very least that Ukraine, Poland, the baltics and others are going to do is strengthen their trade relationships, supply chain relationships and US contract manufacturing business at the expense of China and will be major US advocates in the EU to push it back in their sphere rather than the Chinese/Russian sphere. As long as US state department leadership remains moderately sane and doesn't go the GOP isolationist route (and the recent midterm results indicate that maybe they won't) there's going to be a lot of political and economic gain the for the United States here and perhaps even Eastern Europe if the resulting co-operation treaties are favorable. But again, Putin's terror missile strikes put a damper on that. You can't stop them from firing these missiles without starting WW3 so investing in Ukraine is an extremely risky venture with high reward potential if we can achieve some semblance of stability or Iron Dome style defense.
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Nov 15, 2022 17:41
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Likely it is a response to the G20, the UN vote and the US elections along with Kherson for the Russian Homefront. Putin doesn't have a ton of moves left on the board so they are going to get increasingly brash, outlandish and ineffective as we have seen.
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Nov 15, 2022 17:41
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Kraftwerk posted:Also let's say the Russian military gradually loses any kind of capability to hold Ukrainian territory and retreats to 1994 boundaries. What stops the Russians from just constantly firing missiles every few months to blow up infrastructure, rebuilding efforts and scare away western investors and contractors from ever building up Ukraine? Let's say Russia retreats back to 1994 borders and you see at least a sort of DMZ sort of border ala Korea. You would then likely see NATO troops then be stationed within Ukraine likely nearly immediately. Russia would not want to continue to fire upon Ukraine in chance of hitting foreign troops, which almost certainly bring a response likely in Russian soil. Basically if Russian retreated or is driven back to the 1994 borders or even remotely close to them the conflict is over. Honestly I'd say if they are driven beyond the 2014 borders it is over.
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Nov 15, 2022 17:52
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Kraftwerk posted:Also let's say the Russian military gradually loses any kind of capability to hold Ukrainian territory and retreats to 1994 boundaries. What stops the Russians from just constantly firing missiles every few months to blow up infrastructure, rebuilding efforts and scare away western investors and contractors from ever building up Ukraine? What could it possibly gain from doing that? I don't think turning Russia into an enormous Gaza strip is the goal of anyone in power in Russia. Russia will want to normalise relations with its neighbours at some point.
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Nov 15, 2022 17:55
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Storkrasch posted:What could it possibly gain from doing that? I don't think turning Russia into an enormous Gaza strip is the goal of anyone in power in Russia. You're not wrong but there is no political will or ability to "normalize" relations left in Russia. Their whole system of power is premised on their regional and quasi-ethnic superiority over neighbors.
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Nov 15, 2022 17:57
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Kraftwerk posted:Also let's say the Russian military gradually loses any kind of capability to hold Ukrainian territory and retreats to 1994 boundaries. What stops the Russians from just constantly firing missiles every few months to blow up infrastructure, rebuilding efforts and scare away western investors and contractors from ever building up Ukraine? I'm guessing stopping the sanctions will be the carrot that will be dangled in front of Russia to dissuade them from doing that and prodding them to behave like sane neighbours.
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Nov 15, 2022 18:00
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Mikojan posted:The timing for these strikes is just weird. You'd think they'd do it after a prolonged stalemate where spirits might drop among Ukrainian population, to tilt it to a unfavourable stance and maybe force some talks. But just after a morale booster like taking Kherson? I know pettyness is the answer, but it just feels so dumb It's a giant F**K YOU to the international community. It's saying "This is how much we don't give a rats rear end about your opinion of what we are doing"
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Nov 15, 2022 18:01
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evilweasel posted:it's not about ukranian morale, it's about russian morale. I don't think ineffective "shock and meh" attacks on kindergartens and substations are going to have quite the same impact on Russian morale as the videos of precision bombings of powerplants and bridges* did for Enduring Freedom, or whatever dumb name the US invasion of Iraq had. Like Russian civilians aren't even seeing videos of their country's missiles blowing up Ukrainian powerplants in Lviv, are they? The equivalent stuff was all over the news in the US in March/April 2003. E: Or whatever the US targeted. I spent like 5 minutes looking and couldn't figure out if the US had actually targeted electricity transmission/generation and bridges in the 2003 strikes. VVVV: Yeah, that makes sense. Saladman fucked around with this message at 18:08 on Nov 15, 2022 |
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Nov 15, 2022 18:03
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Saladman posted:I don't think ineffective "shock and meh" attacks on kindergartens and substations are going to have quite the same impact on Russian morale as the videos of precision bombings of powerplants and bridges did for Enduring Freedom, or whatever dumb name the US invasion of Iraq had. Like Russian civilians aren't even seeing videos of their country's missiles blowing up Ukrainian powerplants in Lviv, are they? The equivalent stuff was all over the news in the US in March/April 2003. i mean, i think putin would prefer to have the 2003-era us military to what he has today, but he decided to go to war with the army he's got, and he's trying to get the best images he can get to change the subject from the retreat from kherson with thar army it's about placating the right-wing nationalists who are furious at his perceived weakness by giving them some Ukrainian suffering
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Nov 15, 2022 18:05
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Saladman posted:I don't think ineffective "shock and meh" attacks on kindergartens and substations are going to have quite the same impact on Russian morale as the videos of precision bombings of powerplants and bridges did for Enduring Freedom, or whatever dumb name the US invasion of Iraq had. Like Russian civilians aren't even seeing videos of their country's missiles blowing up Ukrainian powerplants in Lviv, are they? The equivalent stuff was all over the news in the US in March/April 2003. They also don't really need to do it for propaganda purposes - Russia is happy to lie about victories in their media. They fire 100 missiles, have like 80 shot down with the rest landing on empty buildings and claim that all 100 hit vital military targets. Why bother? Just fire 10 and say 100 hit vital military targets. It's lashing out and useless commanders trying to do something tangible to impress those higher up. Putin says you need to strike and you have zero intelligence assets you just... strike blindly.
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Nov 15, 2022 18:07
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Kraftwerk posted:Also let's say the Russian military gradually loses any kind of capability to hold Ukrainian territory and retreats to 1994 boundaries. What stops the Russians from just constantly firing missiles every few months to blow up infrastructure, rebuilding efforts and scare away western investors and contractors from ever building up Ukraine? If Russia doesn't stop after every Ukrainian territory is liberated, strikes into Russian territory would be necessary.
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Nov 15, 2022 18:08
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I don't get why Russia would just stop even after losing anything unless there was a serious internal issue.
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Nov 15, 2022 18:16
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FishBulbia posted:I don't get why Russia would just stop even after losing anything unless there was a serious internal issue. Most likely they'd stop when Ukrainian counterfire destroyed their guns.
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Nov 15, 2022 18:19
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Pook Good Mook posted:You're not wrong but there is no political will or ability to "normalize" relations left in Russia. Their whole system of power is premised on their regional and quasi-ethnic superiority over neighbors. Russia isn't just some primordial evil that is just out to kill people for the fun of it. When it commits some atrocity, it's because it's trying to accomplish something to further its interests, or to satisfy some internal demand. Lobbing missiles at Ukraine indefinitely long after the war is lost doesn't do much of anything to further its interests, but cements their position as an isolated failure. 30 years ago their entire system of power was based on the science of Marxism-Leninism, until one day it wasn't.
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Nov 15, 2022 18:25
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Storkrasch posted:Russia isn't just some primordial evil that is just out to kill people for the fun of it. When it commits some atrocity, it's because it's trying to accomplish something to further its interests, or to satisfy some internal demand. Lobbing missiles at Ukraine indefinitely long after the war is lost doesn't do much of anything to further its interests, but cements their position as an isolated failure. You tell me the way for Russia to "rejoin" the community of nations, or even a position of respect in their region without a top to bottom political leadership change. Because I don't see it. You think Eastern Europe or Central Asia is going to forget this? Or forgive it?
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Nov 15, 2022 18:29
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Storkrasch posted:Russia isn't just some primordial evil that is just out to kill people for the fun of it. When it commits some atrocity, it's because it's trying to accomplish something to further its interests, or to satisfy some internal demand. Lobbing missiles at Ukraine indefinitely long after the war is lost doesn't do much of anything to further its interests, but cements their position as an isolated failure. Of course they can change that at any time but there's no sign of that so far.
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Nov 15, 2022 18:30
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Storkrasch posted:30 years ago their entire system of power was based on the science of Marxism-Leninism, until one day it wasn't. Eh… that’s what the Soviets liked to call it, and they CPSU did rely on the authority principle—the claim of having the sole legitimate authority to interpret the works of Marx and Lenin—to maintain its monopoly on power; however, much like the CPC, in practice the Soviet Union was neither Marxist or Leninist after 1924.
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Nov 15, 2022 18:31
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https://twitter.com/netblocks/status/1592549576531234816?s=20&t=R3HqMAgvwb-ET_-D3wTCHQ https://twitter.com/ELINTNews/status/1592543360082120706
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Nov 15, 2022 18:32
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Pook Good Mook posted:You tell me the way for Russia to "rejoin" the community of nations, or even a position of respect in their region without a top to bottom political leadership change. Because I don't see it. You think Eastern Europe or Central Asia is going to forget this? Or forgive it? They'll stay mad as long as its useful. Historical memory is only activated when useful. Otherwise it is forgotten and forgiven, or relegated to fringe politics.
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Nov 15, 2022 18:33
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FishBulbia posted:They'll stay mad as long as its useful. Historical memory is only activated when useful. Otherwise it is forgotten and forgiven, or relegated to fringe politics. OK then, of what use would it be for any of those states to be friendly with Russia? Russia offers nothing except a top-down patriarchal belief in regional control to the almost exclusive benefit to a landed leadership caste. Other than buying gas from them on the open market, none of their former partners are going to be interested in signing back up to join whatever sphere of influence is left after this. I'm all for a realpolitik as a theory of understanding and action, but there is no valid realpolitik reason to keep up terror bombing in Ukraine. It's spite.
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Nov 15, 2022 18:36
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Pook Good Mook posted:OK then, of what use would it be for any of those states to be friendly with Russia? Russia offers nothing except a top-down patriarchal belief in regional control to the almost exclusive benefit to a landed leadership caste. Probably not any time in the short term. But in 30-40 years? Who knows.
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Nov 15, 2022 18:38
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mmkay posted:I'm guessing stopping the sanctions will be the carrot that will be dangled in front of Russia to dissuade them from doing that and prodding them to behave like sane neighbours. I'm honestly kinda curious how effective the carrot of "we'll stop sanctions" will be exactly. Even if people are legally allowed to trade with Russia again, I have to think that corporations are going to be considering it something of a high-risk investment given the possibility of Putin doing something stupid that zeroes out their investment again. In particular civilian aircraft companies are probably not at all happy about Russia's nationalization of their planes. In the long term capitalism will probably flow where it will, but even then Europe in particular is almost certainly going to be pivoting away from Russian gas regardless as a strategic measure, and most governments are likely going to be checking that they don't have too many Russian dependencies that could be leaned on in the future. In the near to medium term future I suspect that Western/European economic links to Russia will never reach pre-war peaks even if Putin pulls out immediately and agrees to 2014 borders with no conditions.
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Nov 15, 2022 18:40
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Tomn posted:I'm honestly kinda curious how effective the carrot of "we'll stop sanctions" will be exactly. Even if people are legally allowed to trade with Russia again, I have to think that corporations are going to be considering it something of a high-risk investment given the possibility of Putin doing something stupid that zeroes out their investment again. In particular civilian aircraft companies are probably not at all happy about Russia's nationalization of their planes. Investing and building is a risk, but just selling stuff isn't (well, by comparison, anyway.) Even if companies are reluctant, there will be terms that Russia can offer that they will accept - like putting a bunch of cash in escrow to offset potential losses. Ultimately, the capitalist urge to always be growing and FOMO will push companies into the newly-reopened market.
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Nov 15, 2022 18:45
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The issue is Russia under Putin has offered clients three things: 1) Military might, which is now severely degraded. Allies like Armenia are seeking new partners. 2) Cheap Gas, which everyone sees comes with huge preconditions. No one wealthy enough to build the infrastructure to support it will invest in Russia. 3) A bizarre mix of anticolonial grievances and right wing culture war, which isn't really coherent enough to substitute for ML.
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Nov 15, 2022 18:48
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FishBulbia posted:I don't get why Russia would just stop even after losing anything unless there was a serious internal issue. Because it's not free for them to do this; an eternal war like that is expensive to keep going, and Ukraine in a situation where it has managed to recover all its territory would be in a position to shoot back. If Ukraine developed cheap 2 stroke loitering munitions like the Iranian drones currently being used by Russia, you could see power infrastructure in Moscow start blowing up while sidestepping NATO squeamishness about providing long range munitions for strikes on Russian soil. Is Russia willing to keep a hot war going for years if they don't see any possibility of gaining territory from it while under continuous sanctions? Maybe, but it would be by no means costless for them.
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Nov 15, 2022 18:50
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a world in which russia has been forced back into its own borders is a world significantly different enough from today that assuming all existing russian power structures and incentives stay the same is a silly assumption
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Nov 15, 2022 18:51
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How many people hate Germany today? One way or another Russia will "normalize."
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Nov 15, 2022 18:52
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Edgar Allen Ho posted:How many people hate Germany today? One way or another Russia will "normalize." Germany has a functioning political system with an extremely diversified economy that is "tied in" to trading and economic partners. As someone else put it, Russia "normalizing" in the way Germany did requires an entirely new political leadership to the extent that we can't even envision what that looks like. The current political leadership is not capable of "normalizing."
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Nov 15, 2022 18:56
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Even if pushed back to pre 2014 borders Putin can't admit defeat or show weakness without risking a catastrophic loss of power. He will have to continue to pretend that a war is ongoing and winnable in some sense for as long as he remains in power. Terror missile strikes continue to demonstrate that Putin retains the power to order terror missile strikes. That's all. Edgar Allen Ho posted:How many people hate Germany today? One way or another Russia will "normalize." Sure but ww2 was 75 years ago. Yeah sure on the order of twenty years out maybe. evilweasel posted:a world in which russia has been forced back into its own borders is a world significantly different enough from today that assuming all existing russian power structures and incentives stay the same is a silly assumption Ehh, if trend lines continue Russia is going to run out of army sometime before spring anyway. We're already on a path to Ukraine flatly winning this war, the only questions are 1) how long it takes to get there And 2) do any events we cant predict with current trend lines intervene or intersect with or change those paths Hieronymous Alloy fucked around with this message at 19:02 on Nov 15, 2022 |
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Nov 15, 2022 18:58
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Edgar Allen Ho posted:How many people hate Germany today? One way or another Russia will "normalize." Or Vietnamese hate Americans? Thoughts of the population don't influence policy. Policy creates the consciousness of the people. If Russia were challenging China or something we'd be reading about the free Russian spirit and their position as the guardian of Europe.
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Nov 15, 2022 19:03
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Storkrasch posted:Russia isn't just some primordial evil that is just out to kill people for the fun of it. When it commits some atrocity, it's because it's trying to accomplish something to further its interests, or to satisfy some internal demand. Lobbing missiles at Ukraine indefinitely long after the war is lost doesn't do much of anything to further its interests, but cements their position as an isolated failure. I believe the meta-crux of their argument is that the established political regime of Russian Federation is predicated on its ability to prevail, e.g., over the economic adversity of the 90s, and has deliberately built up a political basis for this war in a way interlinks legitimacy of the regime to a triumph, i.e., priming the popular conscience to view it as an existential war of survival. The question, under this framework, is what it is going to look like if the political leadership of Russia refuses to acknowledge a defeat out of the instinct of self-preservation? That said, it’s a decidedly far-fetched theoretical, and it would very remiss of me to invite essays in response. I think it’s fine to have a chat about it tonight, but let’s not get carried away too much. cinci zoo sniper fucked around with this message at 19:10 on Nov 15, 2022 |
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Nov 15, 2022 19:06
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A lost Russian missile seems to have killed 2 people in a polish village, though nothing official yet. PM did call the polish security council an hour or so ago, though. https://twitter.com/wolski_jaros/status/1592575790390345729?cxt=HHwWgoDUgcvP-5ksAAAA
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Nov 15, 2022 19:12
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This is… suboptimal.
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Nov 15, 2022 19:13
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mmkay posted:A lost Russian missile seems to have killed 2 people in a polish village, though nothing official yet. PM did call the polish security council an hour or so ago, though. Not ideal Maybe they shouldn't be taking swings at Ukrainian infrastructure that far west if they can't keep the targeting straight Ukraine was already calling for Russia to be expelled from the G20 for the round of missiles today, I can't imagine this will make that quieter. There are reports that Russia's delegation 'left' after speaking with the US delegation, but not from any concrete sources. https://twitter.com/DmytroKuleba/status/1592535911455424512?s=20&t=_cSPwjjs75M6Zpk_Lv38uw The US 'strongly condemned' the attacks, as per the usual https://twitter.com/komadovsky/status/1592550021907763202?s=20&t=_cSPwjjs75M6Zpk_Lv38uw
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Nov 15, 2022 19:23
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mmkay posted:A lost Russian missile seems to have killed 2 people in a polish village, though nothing official yet. PM did call the polish security council an hour or so ago, though. Accidentally setting off Article 5 cause your missiles suck too bad. 2 people dying probably won't set off anything right away, but I could see Poland calling for something like "no strikes west of the Dnipro" to a no-fly-zone. It's surprising how much countries can let slide, like the shooting down of M-17 didn't bring anyone in to the war in 2014. But Russia just killed people in exactly the wrong country at exactly the wrong time.
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Nov 15, 2022 19:26
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Ah, condemnations, the thoughts and prayers of foreign policy.
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Nov 15, 2022 19:27
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Linking just the article because the tweet source is trash - any Pole or Pole-adjacent goons wanna comment on how reliable this news source is? https://wiadomosci.radiozet.pl/Polska/rakiety-spadly-na-polske-sa-ofiary-smiertelne Notable excerpt: quote:Unofficially, it is also known that military planes were picked up from the airport near Tomaszów Lubelski. edit: for once I feel like Visegrad is an appropriate source https://twitter.com/visegrad24/status/1592583021911330816?s=20&t=MMvZAIGwa1TCkWZnbJ11vQ edit2: To clarify - Visegrad 24 is a very weird and nationalist publication, but they are I believe based out of Poland. So in this case they'll be accurate but anything they say should be viewed through their nationalist and anti-russian lens. Mentioning article 5 is not surprising but I doubt it'll come to pass KitConstantine fucked around with this message at 19:38 on Nov 15, 2022 |
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Nov 15, 2022 19:28
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cinci zoo sniper posted:This is… suboptimal. I hope the Poles keep an level headed approach in the next few days. The on ramp has now just appeared out of nowhere. If the Poles make a lot of noise, there is going to be a lot of tension wrt to maintaining NATO credibility vs staying off the highway.
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Nov 15, 2022 19:40
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It's an accidental attack so nothing that could call people in over on. I guess if Poland is pissed enough they enter on their own though but that isn't going to happen.
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Nov 15, 2022 19:43
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yeah agreed this is escalationrisk.jpg NATO has to respond somehow to retain credibility, Russia counter-escalates, etc etc etc WW3. Not. Good.
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